Happy Birthday - Gary Carter

 

Gary was born on this day in 1954, and he passed on February 16th, 2012.

MLB Debut - September 16th, 1974 (Expos)

Years Active - 

• 1974-1984 (Expos)
• 1984-1989 (Mets)
• 1990 (Giants)
• 1991 (Dodgers)
• 1992 (Expos)

Cards on TCDB - 6324 cards (2026), 6078 cards (2025), 5649 cards (2024), 5339 cards (2023), 4904 cards (2022), 4511 cards (2021)

Cards I have - 363 cards (2026), 357 cards (2025), 351 cards (2024), 319 cards (2023), 249 cards (2022), 141 cards (2021)

PC Rank - #9 (#11 overall)

TCDB Rank - #13

Where they came from -

• Sportlots (160 cards)
• Ebay (84 cards)
• Card Show-Michigan City (24 cards)
• F&G Sportscards (21 cards)
• Sluggos (20 cards)
• Just Commons (12 cards)
• Unknown (11 cards)
• Too Many Verlanders (10 cards)
• 2x3 Heroes (6 cards)
• Card Show-Elkhart (3 cards)
• Hollister's (2 cards)
• Fred Sawyer (1 card)
• North Carolina (1 card)
• Packs (1 card)
• Stephanie (1 card)

Happy Birthday Gary!

A Non-Birthday post?

Long time no see!

I know I've been posting the birthday posts and I've done a pretty good job at not being late on any of them (other than some being late at night before I get them up.) I enjoy those because I can see how far my collection has come since the previous year. I'm going to try to start posting incoming again. I stopped because at the time, I was working shows and just didn't have the time with everything coming in. Now I only hit a few shows a year and get a few trades here and there. I did order another Sportlots order but I haven't hit ship yet, waiting on one guy to get my cards to the box. So here goes nothing.

You should know if you follow me at all, that I sort cards for the LCS here and in exchange, I can keep whatever I find that I like. That's easy for him to do because I only keep specific collections and for the most part, the cards that I'm sorting are base and commons but it fills in gaps in my PC's. That's not all I get though. When I browse his shop and find some cards, he'll give me a huge discount or sometimes, not charge me at all. For example, he gave me this last week.

I was in the shop when a lady came in with some cards and this. He bought it all for very little. This has a COA but from a company we've never heard of so he knew he wasn't going to be able to sell it very well. He has other Griffey autos in the shop in Mariners uniform with good COA's and he hasn't sold those so he offered it to me. He knows I'm not looking to sell it and it will go in my PC so I jumped on it. I haven't done anything with it yet, which is why it's just leaning on my shelf, on the floor.

I also get a lot of common cards to fill team sets of the Sox but I'm not going to show a lot of that so I'll just show my PC adds.

Here I said I wasn't going to show team stuff but it's shiny and I couldn't resist. He's no longer with the Sox as he was traded a couple of days ago and I no longer PC him anyways but I still collect Sox cards so he stays. He was with the team long enough that I've accumulated 346 cards of him.

Since I'm doing Sox cards, I'll go ahead and throw these in as well. These are all Tiffany versions. I only had 2 to start with, I added these 26 and am now only 1 card short of the team set.

I know you're thinking, he didn't have that yet, but this is the Tiffany version as well which as you can see above, there was a bunch of those in the sorting boxes. This is my 362nd card of the Kid.

I added another of Hendriks which I don't do a lot of, I only added 3 cards all of last year. He sits at 61 cards now.

I also located an older Larkin that I didn't have which is always nice. I only added 10 cards of his last year so I don't get a ton of his anymore which tends to happen when they aren't included in newer sets. I now have 781 cards of Barry.

The next 3 guys you'll see are all former White Sox that I liked when they were here and decided to continue to collect them anyways. You can also add Dylan Cease to that list but I didn't add any of his this week.

When Madrigal was traded away, I hated it. He wasn't a superstar by any means but he was a slap hitter. They called him 2 strikes Nicky because he would get all kinds of hits with 2 strikes. He just got on base, a lot, which I loved but I stopped PCing him when he got traded but I've added him back in and along with the other Sox cards of him that I kept, his count is up to 118.

I really hated this trade because I knew he was good and was only going to get better, now he's a Cy Young contender. Luckily, I picked up a few autos of him because he was a Sox prospect so I got them cheap. This Boston Sox card gives me 59 cards of him.

Another non-superstar that I liked. He's a lefty power hitter but not much of anything else. Plus he ended up going to San Diego with Cronenworth and Cease so I followed the Padres a little bit last year but Cease is gone now. This card gives me 84 of Gavin.

The show owner actually gave this one to me in his shop. While he does his own sorting, he sets aside Sox and Michigan cards for me and hands them to me when I come in. I think it's funny that I've got him and a guy at work that I trade with learning all the Michigan players because they give me cards. They are both Notre Dame fans. This is my 23rd card of the younger Howard.

My Nico collection is doing pretty good since he's doing very well in the NFL. Even though he has an Ohio QB throwing to him (who didn't fare too well with Nico out). The Absolute is the retail version but the Illusions is not the retail version which I rarely ever see. I always find the retail versions of these kinds of cards. I now have 103 cards of Collins.

Last but definitely not least, the last box I sorted had a mixture of old and new. Old usually means 80's and 90's but occasionally I'll find a few vintage cards in there like the 2 above. The Champion is my 367th from the 1975 Topps set which is just above 55% complete and the Cullen is my 257th card of the 1972 Topps set which is good for almost 33% complete.

That's all for now, hopefully there will be more in the future. I have them all scanned, now it's finding time to type them up.

Happy Birthday - Gary Carter

Gary was born on this day in 1954, and he passed on February 16th, 2012.

MLB Debut - September 16th, 1974 (Expos)

Years Active - 

• 1974-1984 (Expos)
• 1984-1989 (Mets)
• 1990 (Giants)
• 1991 (Dodgers)
• 1992 (Expos)

Cards on TCDB - 6078 cards (2025), 5649 cards (2024), 5339 cards (2023), 4904 cards (2022), 4511 cards (2021)

Cards I have - 357 cards (2025), 351 cards (2024), 319 cards (2023), 249 cards (2022), 141 cards (2021)

PC Rank - #9 (#11 overall)

TCDB Rank - #11

Where they came from -

• Sportlots (160 cards)
• Ebay (84 cards)
• Card Show-Michigan City (24 cards)
• F&G Sportscards (20 cards)
• Sluggos (19 cards)
• Just Commons (12 cards)
• Unknown (11 cards)
• Too Many Verlanders (10 cards)
• 2x3 Heroes (6 cards)
• Card Show-Elkhart (3 cards)
• Hollister's (2 cards)
• Fred Sawyer (1 card)
• North Carolina (1 card)
• Packs (1 card)

Happy Birthday Gary!

Happy Birthday - Gary Carter

 

Gary was born on this day in 1954, and passed on February 16th, 2012.

MLB Debut - September 16th, 1974 (Expos)

Years Active - 

• 1974-1984 (Expos)
• 1984-1989 (Mets)
• 1990 (Giants)
• 1991 (Dodgers)
• 1992 (Expos)

Cards on TCDB - 5649 cards (2024), 5339 cards (2023), 4904 cards (2022), 4511 cards (2021)

Cards I have - 351 cards (2024), 319 cards (2023), 249 cards (2022), 141 cards (2021)

PC Rank - #9 (#10 overall)

TCDB Rank - #8

Where they came from -

• Sportlots (160 cards)
• Ebay (84 cards)
• Card Show-Michigan City (24 cards)
• Sluggos (18 cards)
• F&G Sportscards (15 cards)
• Just Commons/Card Barrel (12 cards)
• Unknown (11 cards)
• Too Many Verlanders (10 cards)
• 2x3 Heroes (6 cards)
• Card Show-Elkhart (3 cards)
• Hollister's (2 cards)
• Fred Sawyer (1 card)
• North Carolina (1 card)
• Packs (1 card)

Happy Birthday Gary!

HOF'ers and more

Today's post are the cards I returned to the shop last weekend. I organized the list players for my LCS, luckily, it was baseball as I have more than a few PC's that align with the list. The list consists of players that the guy we sell them too has guys that he can sell, there is a list of current and older non HOF'ers plus any HOF'er is included.

Let's see what I got to keep.

We'll start with the team collections.

A couple of Minnie Minoso, a Frank Thomas and an Early Wynn. Not too bad to start with it. I've been getting a lot of the platinum anniversary cards lately.

The 2 Minoso's give me 15 of him.

1019 of Frank Thomas now which is the only player I have over 1k of.

The shiny Wynn gives me 10 of him.

Next up are Tier 3 which a bunch of my PC's are HOF'ers.

I added 4 more of Johnny Bench. The top 2 are from this years Donruss but the bottom 2 I had never seen before. The left one is from the Ted Williams set in 1993. While the right one looks familiar, it is actually an insert set from the 1992 Upper Deck set, not the 2008 set.

These 4 cards give me 238 cards of Johnny.

I also picked up a couple more cards of the kid. One old, one fairly new. With all the sorting of junk wax I've done, you would think I already had the 1988 Donruss All-Star. The other is a Select from 2022.

These 2 give me 349 cards of Carter.

I added 7 more of Mike Schmidt. The top 5 are all from the previously mentioned Ted Williams set, only a year later. The bottom row consists of 1989 Cereal Superstars, I'd be curious what cereal they came from. The right is a 2022 Archives card.

These 7 give me 351 cards of Schmidt.

I also got 1 of Yastrzemski. This is a 2005 Fan Favorite, the 2nd 1963 look-a-like of this post.

This Yaz gives me 183 cards.

Next up are my Tier 2 PC's.

I found 2 more of Pudge, 1 from each of the Sox. You see another of the Platinum Anniversary cards. Along with a Topps Finest from 1993.

These 2 give me 380 of Fisk.

I picked up an Eloy Prizm, but not my only Prizm of this post. This is also a milestone card of Eloy.

This card gives me 200 cards of the Big Baby which puts me #5 on TCDB.

You get another Prizm White Sox with these 3 additions of Moncada. Along with a 2021 Chrome and a 2022 A&G. I've been picking up the A&G's a lot recently.

These 3 give me 226 cards of Yoan which puts me at #1 on TCDB.

It was nice to grab a few of Larkin (I think I got a few for Dennis as well). You see another 2022 A&G only of the X (not old Twitter) variety. A 1998 Chrome which you don't see too often and the one on the right is a Stadium Club Member's only 55 (not sure what the 55 is about). I had never seen that one before. I also got this Showcase Series from 1998 Score.

These 4 give me 746 of the former Wolverine.

I also managed to get a couple from my Tier 1 collections.

I found another 2023 Donruss in the form of Tom Terrific and a 2015 Stadium Club of Aparicio. Nothing too flashy but needs all the same.

The Aparicio gives me 134 cards which moves me into the #1 spot on TCDB.

The Seaver gives me 575 cards which puts me at #4 on TCDB.

Lotta Tier 3

We set up in Kalamazoo today and received a couple of visitors. Dennis of Too Many Verlanders and John of John's Big League Baseball Blog came in to visit us. Dennis saved some postage and brought me some cards which you will probably not see until next weekend since we are setting up at another show tomorrow so I won't have time until next weekend to get them logged and scanned. Kevin also gave me some cards to get through so I have plenty to do on my next day off.

John even got his wife to snap a pic of us.

It was a decent show, it was our first time there so we didn't have many expectations which is how we take any first time shows.

Today's post will be of the random variety and tier 3 came up.

I mentioned the quarter boxes that I hit in Michigan City, these 23 cards of the Kid are a product of that, lots of oddball stuff up there which was why I decided to go through it all.

I also picked this one up from my LCS while sorting. The new Donruss set has a bunch of my retired Tier 3 PC's, including this one.

More quarter box finds from Michigan City. These 10 of another HOF'er. You even get an 1981 Fleer card for the Vintage set (only need 19 more) and one White Sox card for that team collection. The Giants card is only my 3rd of the lefty in those team colors.

11 Ripken's from the aforementioned quarter box. Lots of those oddball create your own sets from the late 80's, early 90's. The good old days when unlicensed still had logos.

These 3 came from a sort of list players from my LCS, all HOF'ers are on the list of players to pull so I usually get some tier 3 cards. These 3 all came from the box I did the first weekend of the month. That bottom card is another one of those unlicensed make your own sets. You can also see Frank Thomas on it as well so that one goes towards the White Sox collection as well.

Last but not least, this relic of Cal was in that half off box at my LCS which I ended up getting for free for sorting for them. I'm pretty sure it's my first relic of his. 13 of these 15 cards put me at 950 cards of Ripken which is my highest count of PC players. I do have one non-player collection who has more.

37 cards from the quarter boxes, you can see how I spent $42 at the quarter boxes.

These 2 I picked up in the sorting of list players. I found a number of those 2022 A&G's that I needed. 

This was the only quarter box card of Bench that I found in Michigan city.

These 2 were from the sorting of the list players. You see another 2022 A&G. I would have guessed I already had the 1987 look-a-like but I apparently didn't.

This was another card from the half off box. I knew my LCS was going to give me a good deal so I went ahead and through this is my stack even though it's a manufactured relic. I didn't think I'd get it free but that's even better.

These 2 chrome cards came from some sorting that Kevin was doing. I like them both as one is a vintage look-a-like and the other is a Stadium Club so there's a good chance it's a photograph you haven't seen before.

I actually paid for these 2 and no, they aren't reprints. I made it all the way through the Plymouth card show without looking at any cards and was thinking I was going to get out without spending anything. Josh, the show promoter, asked me if I saw the vintage I had on his table because he knows that I love it. Now I feel obligated so I go over there and end up spending $40. Not on just these 2, you'll see another one in this post and a bunch on my next vintage post.

These 5 were also quarter box finds from Michigan City. You can see I found a ton of cards for my PC's. These aren't all, I also found quite a few on a couple other PC's that you'll see later and some Sox cards.

I told you I picked up some of the 2023 Donruss in the sorting, this is another one. 

These both came from the other list sort. That is a 1980 Topps but that isn't a 1975 Topps. It's a 60 Years of Topps Original back.

This is a 1972 Topps (it's kind of sad that you even have to point it out with the millions of reprints out there). This was another card that was on the show promoter's table. You'll see the other 4 vintage on the vintage post and I also picked up a Sox auto of the next Sox post.

I know that's a lot of cards for 1 post but I figured I'd throw up all my hall of fame tier 3 collections. I'll have another tier 3 post but it'll be the non hall of famers.